Whitney Thompson is America’s first plus-sized Top Model

For the first time in the show’s 10-season history, America’s next next next next next next next next next next top model isn’t a skinny, breakable thing, but a plus-sized model, which basically means she’s the size of actual women.

Whitney Thompson won America’s Next Top Model 10 last night, defeating Anya Kop. “There’s definitely times I’ve looked in the mirror and looked at other girls and thought, I wasn’t like them. … I want other women in America to feel good about themselves,” she said after winning, according to MTV.

Her win has been surrounded by speculation that Whitney was essentially a plant and may have even been asked to gain weight to appear on the show. Pre-show photographs do show Whitney to be a lot thinner than she is currently.

And Four Four quotes from an anonymous source who cites yet another anonymous source with details about the conspiracy theory: “The source is this wonderfully chatty boy in one of my classes…who says he went to high school with Whitney. The claim is that Whitney did not try out for top model but was approached on a plane by someone from the show. She was already doing modeling as a size 2 or 4 but because she was closer to a 4 she was a little too big for the show as a regular model. They told her that if she went and gained 10-20 pounds they would definitely put her on the show as “the plus-size model”. She’s about a 6 or 8 on the show. He even showed us this picture of her when she was smaller which was from a year ago.”

about Andy Dehnart

Andy Dehnart is a journalist who has covered reality television for more than 15 years and created reality blurred in 2000. A member of the Television Critics Association, his writing and criticism about television, culture, and media has appeared on NPR and in Playboy, Buzzfeed, and many other publications. Andy, 37, also directs the journalism program at Stetson University in Florida, where he teaches creative nonfiction and journalism. He has an M.F.A. in nonfiction writing and literature from Bennington College. More about reality blurred and Andy.

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